VIDEO: Witness John Coltrane’s Poem Transformed Into Music For “A Love Supreme”

Poetry in motion encapsulates this video showing John Coltrane’s poem for “Psalm”, the fourth movement of his iconic album “A Love Supreme” in tandem with the music.

Hidden codes within music add flavour and character. Donuts is littered with secret meanings, Dark Side Of The Moon is infamous for the rumoured parallels between the album and The Wizard of Oz. In 1965, John Coltrane and his quartet recorded “A Love Supreme”, one of most influential jazz albums of all time. Video uploader James Cary was the man behind this video and describes its origins as follows:

A few years ago, knowing I absolutely adored the John Coltrane album, “A Love Supreme” my wife gave me this incredible book by Ashley Kahn : “A Love Supreme/The Story of John Coltrane’s Signature Album.” Reading the book, I discovered something remarkable: the fourth movement, Psalm, was actually John Coltrane playing the ‘words’ of the poem that was included in the original liner notes. Apparently he put the handwritten poem on the music stand in front of him, and ‘played’ it, as if it were music. I immediately played the movement while reading the poem, and the hair stood up on the back of my neck. It was one of the most inspirational and spiritual moments of my life.

The relationship between speech and music has been studied by music technology experts for many years and while this doesn’t bridge the gap, it holds a certain spiritual value in its call to God through a form of communication not readily comprehensible. Whatever you believe, this may hold a value close to you.